


All This Time

by CeiphiedKnight



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-07
Updated: 2016-04-07
Packaged: 2018-05-31 21:26:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6487939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CeiphiedKnight/pseuds/CeiphiedKnight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>All this time<br/>We were waiting for each other<br/>All this time<br/>I was waiting for you<br/>We got all these words<br/>Can't waste them on another<br/>So I'm straight in a straight line<br/>Running back to you</p>
            </blockquote>





	All This Time

** All This Time **

Marinette had no idea why she’d given Chat Noir her phone number.

I mean, there was the fact that he’d asked nicely. And, honestly, she felt a bit sorry for him. He was nice and he made her laugh, but she got the feeling that he was lonely. So lonely that he’d come to her balcony twice a week (on the days he patrolled alone, she’d noted) and they’d spend hours talking about nothing. There was never much depth, unfortunately, because of the whole secret identity thing…but Marinette still felt as though she had gotten to know much more about the boy behind the mask than she ever had as Ladybug.

He was an only child (like her) and he loved sweets, even though he wasn’t allowed to have them for some reason. She had prodded a little bit more at that statement, trying to understand what was so dangerous about a teenage boy having dessert, but he refused to elaborate.

Before she knew it, she was looking forward to his visits so much that she couldn’t concentrate on anything else. A nervous energy would come over her as she waited to hear the sound of his boots landing on the balcony above her bedroom, and she found herself rushing to him.

Finally, one night, she’d let him come in. 

They’d sat on her bed, whispering and sharing as many secrets as they safely could.

After a particularly cheesy pun, she’d giggled and kissed him on the cheek.

As she pulled back, her cheeks burned at what she had done. His turned pink, too, but he remained composed.

That’s when he’d asked for her number. “Just in case,” he’d said.

And now she was in a pinch.

“My Lady?” Chat Noir was staring at her from one of the observation decks high up on the Eiffel Tower.

He was holding his phone, having just input her civilian phone number in case they ever needed to reach one another in a non-magical emergency. 

She was, in turn, holding her own phone which she had just used to input his civilian phone number.

Both of them were looking down in concern at the messages they received.

_Duplicate Number: Marinette_

_Duplicate Number: Adrien_

“I have to go,” Ladybug said in a single breath, and then was zipping away on her yo-yo in the blink of an eye.

Chat Noir watched her go with a lazy smile on his face.

He didn’t need to give chase, because he knew where she was going.

****

Marinette paced her room, unable to reconcile the two green-eyed blonde boys in her life.

It wasn’t possible. She would have known. She knew everything about Adrien.

With a huff, she muttered, “apparently not” under her breath.

“Apparently not what?” came a voice from the loft that housed her bed and a few other odds and ends.

Marinette squeaked and nearly fell over herself as she turned to the voice.

Adrien Agreste sat upon her bed, hanging lazily over the side just a bit, looking down at her.

Marinette knew her face was burning, and for once it wasn’t just in embarrassment.

She was angry, too.

“You could have at least knocked,” she said, her tone clipped and curt. 

Adrien seemed completely unaffected by his school friend being Ladybug, and even less affected by her rudeness.

He jumped nimbly down from the loft, landing in front of her in a way that left no room to doubt that he was, indeed, Chat Noir.

When he straightened up in front of Marinette, and she really looked at him, she felt foolish. Of course this boy was her crime-fighting partner. They held themselves in the same way, though Chat was slightly more relaxed. Their mannerisms, their smiles, that _hair_ …

“I’m sorry, princess,” Adrien said when he thought Marinette may never speak again. The nickname came easily to him, though it made Marinette jump a bit in surprise.

“Sorry for what?” she finally said.

“For not telling you the truth. For insinuating myself into your life as Chat Noir. The night I took your number is the night I should have told you.”

Marinette was frowning. “That doesn’t make any sense. You had no idea that I was Ladybug, and I certainly never would have expected you to tell me your secret identity.”

Adrien sighed and flopped down into her computer chair like it was the most natural thing in the world.

As if he fit perfectly into her life.

As if he’d already been there.

_Because he had._

“That’s true,” he conceded. “But it would have been the right thing to do because, the night I asked for your number, was the night I fell for you.”

Marinette's mouth fell open in shock, but she simply didn’t have the energy to close it. Too bad Alya wasn’t around to help her out.

Adrien filled the silence again, because Marinette’s face didn’t betray anything that she may be thinking or feeling beyond her surprise at his confession.

Jumping up from her chair, he took two long strides to her and placed his hands gently upon her shoulders.

“Marinette,” he said. “Don’t you see? I’ve fallen in love with _you_. And I have a hunch that you fell in love with me, too. Or, that is, with Chat Noir. Which is really great, because Chat Noir is the me that I’m most proud of. He’s the fun, free, silly me. And you…you’re also Ladybug. But it was Marinette who finally overshadowed Ladybug in my heart. I loved Ladybug even though I thought she was this perfect goddess that I’d never deserve in a million years…but no one is perfect. I’m certainly not! Now we know both sides of each other, and there’s no need to choose. No one has to get hurt! Because _we are both_.”

At that, Marinette felt the tears fill her eyes. She tried to blink them back, but it was too much. She felt them as they left her eyes and made warm trails down her cheeks.

“No one has to get hurt?” She repeated, her voice thick with emotion. “I think it’s a little too late for that.”

At her words, Adrien’s face fell.

“What did I do? Tell me what I can do to fix this…”

Marinette turned her back to him and said with as much force as she could muster, “ _Please_ , I need time to think. You don’t understand…you can’t understand…”

“Then _tell me_ ,” Adrien begged. “Please, explain it to me so that I can understand!”

_It’s just that I’ve been in love with you since the moment you gave me your umbrella, which I still have, and I was going to wait for you forever until a silly cat boy came into my life and ruined everything._

Marinette shook her head, sending loose strands of hair fluttering around her flushed face.

She turned back to Adrien, and he would swear he’d never seen a more beautiful sight.

“I feel like,” she began, worrying at her bottom lip with her teeth and trying to put her thoughts into some sort of order. “I feel like no matter what I do, I keep falling in love with you. First Adrien, the sweet boy who works really hard and never says anything bad about anyone. The boy with hair like summer and eyes like spring, who gave me his umbrella and let his designer clothes get drenched in the rain and actually _smiled_ about it. And then, without even knowing it, I fell in love with you again. Bad puns and all. You made me laugh, you made me feel safe. And I feel so stupid for not noticing it sooner. Hair like summer and eyes like spring.”

Adrien’s eyes had gone wide as her words finally penetrated through the coarseness of this situation.

She loved him.

He couldn’t have stopped the huge smile spreading across his face even if he’d wanted to.

Marinette looked up at him through her eyelashes, as if testing the waters to see how he would react.

He had taken another step closer, and placed a finger gently under her chin so that he could slowly coax her to look up at him.

She finally did the brave thing and looked into the eyes of this strange boy who was standing in her bedroom in the middle of the night, looking at her like she hung the moon, and who was actually two strange boys.

“Marinette,” he said, so softly that she wasn’t even sure she’d heard him. “Can I kiss you?”

She could feel her cheeks heating up again, but she fought the urge to look back down.

“Y-Yes,” she said, head held high.

And that’s when soft lips met for the first time, and four people got everything they’d ever wanted.

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first ever fanfic on AO3. If you'd told me a month ago that it would be something for the Ladybug fandom, I would have laughed in your face. And yet, here we are!
> 
> This story came about because I started thinking about all of the fic I've seen of our crazy kids texting each other and saying some very incriminating things that would be VERY BAD if they got out! So I took that idea and rolled with it.
> 
> Characters are not mine, yadda yadda. Song quote is from "All This Time" by OneRepublic. Find me on Tumblr with this same handle.


End file.
